135 BPM
by wishbone23
Summary: All I've ever wanted was a pokemon. Just a companion who I could bide my time with. But after a visit to the hospital I've found that my heart's too weak for pretty much anything. The thing is, sometimes we've got to risk everything to get what we want, and in the process, we learn a little about who we are.
1. 75 BPM

Bedsheets. Funny how when you've been in the hospital long enough they feel like a prison. You can't leave them, if you do the nurses will punish you. Of course, that's only when you've been in the hospital as long as I have. When you're new everyone's friendly and nice. The nurses must not like it when you stay too long. Maybe they have some sort of meetings in which they pick and choose when to stop being nice to someone.

Granted, as of now the punishments are, "no television for the next hour," or some kind of strict talking to. It's not just punishments though. The nurses have gotten used to me being here enough that they drop all nice acts as soon as they enter my room.

They must find nurses in Hell.

Some of the nurses are nicer though; they usually send the nice ones to the people who are going to die soon. In this hospital you know you're going to die when thenice nurses start coming into your room, and if you live here long enough you learn to know which ones those are.

The door to my hospital bed opens and I look to see who it is. It's Edna, one of the nicer nurses, but not quite nice enough to be telling me that I'm going to die. That's nice, I don't plan on dying today. She closes the door behind her. She's never closed my door before, but I've heard that it's not a good sign. Dang it, she's bringing bad news, maybe the nicer nurses are busy and Edna's the best they could do.

"I have good news and bad news," she says to me. Her voice is curt, like she just wants to stop talking to me now.

Edna has never liked being the one to bring bad news to someone.

"What's the good news?" I ask. I try to be as apathetic sounding as possible, but on the inside I'm quite nervous.

"You should be leaving the hospital on Wednesday, you know, if your heart condition doesn't get any worse," she says. Today's Monday, and considering the fact that I've been here for months, the fact that I'll be leaving the day after next is amazing.

"Woohoo! So what's the bad news?" Nothing could bring me down now, I'm leaving this demonic hospital! I can go on a pokemon journey! I've only waited for six years more than every other kid.

"Well, if your heart rate goes over 135 beats per minutes it may become overworked, causing it to stop pumping blood. Because of this you will not be able to put much physical strain on yourself, be overly surprised, overly stressed, or overly exited." Looks like I spoke too soon.

"So I can't do anything ever again? Isn't there some kind of surgery you can give me?"

"The physical ramifications of having surgery are often not worth the benefits or having surgery to being with, so we try to refrain from using surgery whenever possible."

"And because of budget cuts."

"Yes, those too, I guess."

"So basically I can't have fun anymore, right?"

"I never said that."

"But what the heck am I supposed to do to pass the time?"

"That'll be for you to find out." She winks at me before leaving the room.

"Yeah, wonderful. Beware young Axel, fun is lurking around every corner! Fun is dangerous! It'll kill you in your sleep! It murders young orphans and puts the dead bodies in the river to hide the evidence!" Joking to myself about the situation makes me feel a little better, but, of course, I can't help but feel down hearted at the news. Enda walks back into the room.

"I'm sorry, I completely forgot to give you this," she says, holding out a black watch for me to put on. I take it from her and put it on my right wrist.

"What's this for, to remind me to make the most of the time I have left to do nothing with my life?" I ask.

"It's actually a heart rate monitor. The technology to take a heart rate from the wrist has been recently improved dramatically, so why not put it to good use?"

"So I should watch this and if it gets to 135 I should stop doing whatever I'm doing?"

"No, you should stop at 120 or so, 135 would be putting you right on the edge of death."

"Sometimes I feel like I'm already halfway dead."

"Well, you'll be out of the hospital soon and you'll be able to live your life again."

"As long as it doesn't involve fun."

"I wouldn't say that."

"I have a question, I know going on some kind of epic pokemon journey is out of the question, but can I pick one up from Professor Juniper? I don't even have to pick it up, my parents can do that and bring it home."

"It seems like you'd be pretty happy to have one; thus your heart rate may increase, and you could die." I give her a doubtful look. "I'm kidding about that part, but pets can do some crazy things sometimes, and what if it does something that increases your heart rate past the max? Or what if your pet dies? Then your heart rate would increase due to stress. Truthfully, it's best for you to have as few social connections as possible. That way when you die you impact less people and less people's death impacts you." For once I'm glad that I don't really have any friends.

"Right. Wait, what if my parents die, then my heart rate would increase too! We should ban me from having parents!"

"I assume that you're joking." I nod, even though it was mockery, not joking. I'm sure she doesn't really care about the difference between the two. "Good, you know as well as I do that your condition makes it quite difficult for you to look after yourself."

"Yeah, I'll never be a self-reliant person, that's fine, it's never having a pokemon that's going to tick me off for the rest of my short life. How long do you think I have anyways? If I have a weak heart then doesn't that mean that I'll die sooner than normal?"

"You know a lot about all of this, don't you? I was hoping on telling you some other time, to spread out the bad news over the course of a couple days, but it seems that that hope is dead and gone. I'd say that you have around ten years left, though I wouldn't bet on it."

I thank Edna before she leaves again, she seems to be in a hurry. No one ever said that being a nurse was easy, I guess.


	2. 80 BPM

I can hear the rain slamming down on the roof of the log cabin in the middle of a forest which I now call my home. I wish I could feel it though, instead of just being a useless bystander while the rain just keeps falling. I've pretty much forgotten what rain looks like, I've been in the hospital so long, and I'd like to know. But no, I'm me, so I'm stuck in a log cabin in the middle of nowhere.

My parents said that it would be good to, "get away from it all, and to take a breath of the sweet sweet outdoors". In other words, they want to keep me far away from any living being, other than themselves, forever.

I think I may have romanticized getting out of the hospital, all I've done is move from being chained to one bed to being loosely chained to another. At least here my parents let me walk around the house without punishment, but of course, they still have to watch me whenever I walk, and they're not always free. Someone needs to pay the bills, and I obviously can't get a job.

While walking, I've thought of falling several times, just to freak my parents out, but then they might take away my walking privileges. Most people take walking for granted, but I enjoy it, it wakes me up a little, and to be moderately self-sufficient is good for my pride.

How can I even have any pride left? I'm being observed even while _walking_. What's next, are they going to have to watch me sleep?

I sit in bed thinking about these things when my mother knocks on my door. She does that a lot, I hate how she seems to think that she needs to check up on me every hour or so, I'm not some kind of sociopath who'll murder everyone when I get the chance, I just have a heart issue.

My mom is a plump, short woman. She works hard to braid her long blond hair every morning, but personally I think it's a waste of time. Dad already loves her, so why does she need to look what she seems to think is good every day? She walks in with a bowl of soup and puts in on my nightstand, which was right next to my bed.

"Hey honey, how are you feeling?" She says to me. She sits down on my bed and looks at me expectantly.

"Fine, just like last hour, and the hour before, and the hour before-" I start.

"Sorry, I'm just worried about you. I know the doctors said that you can't make any friends, and that must just make you ever so lonely," she says. She speaks softly, but simply and slowly, like I was a young child or something.

"Mom, you know that I'm sixteen, not six, right?" I ask, a little too harshly.

"Sorry, was I using a tone that made you feel like a child? It's just that, to me, you still are a child," she says.

"Well, you have to understand that I'm old enough to take care of myself, even if I can't actually do it," I say.

"I'll try my best, honey," she says before walking out of my room. She forgot to close the door; she usually does. It always ticks me off when she does that, then I have to hear the noises of everything that's going on in the house, and it annoys me to hear all of those noises in _my _room. Somewhere in the thoughts about door closing's importance it hits me, this is my life, I'm forever destined to be alone. I'll never get married, or have children, or go on an epic adventure. No, I'll just stay here and slowly die.

Am I truly even alive anymore? It feels to me like I'm just living a ten year death. Living a ten year death, is that really better than a ten minute life?

Looking back, everything that anyone's ever done to me, or anything I've ever complained about seems like a trivial matter. It seems so silly to even care about something as stupid as grades in school, or if a friend's mad at you, or even something like a break up. It's not like either party dies from the break up, they're just sad. Sadness is something that can be fixed, heart problems like mine, apparently, are not.

If I could wake up one day, and not have my heart condition, not have to be monitored as I walk, not have to stay in the house forever, and could finally make some friends. Well, I'd never be sad again. Once you've died, you know what real pain is, until then, all pain is just an overreaction, a joke. There is no pain like a life that can't be liven, a prolonged death that's full of nothing but pain.

"Hey, can I see Axel?" I hear a female voice ask. For once I'm glad that my mom left the door open. It sounds like my friend Larisa's voice, I haven't heard that voice in months. It looks like even living in the middle of the forest can't keep her away.

"No dear, I'm sorry, but Axel's not really allowed to talk to his friends anymore," Mom says. It would be nice to talk to Larisa, and I probably will. Normally she can get what she wants from my mom, considering the fact that my mom can't really do anything to her, and the fact that she's Larisa. Larisa almost always gets what she wants, that's just how the world works.

"Oh come on, , if I don't talk to Axel now, when will I? I just want to give him some advice, just a quick talk, that's all. What are you afraid that I'm going to do, stab his eyes out? He's my best friend, and I wasn't able to see him at the hospital at all. I just want to see my best friend one more time. One more time, Axel shouldn't have any regrets," Larisa says. I had never heard such a convincing speech from her, so perhaps she actually had something important to say. Normally she would exaggerate to get to see me when she couldn't, but she had never gone this far. Desperate times call for desperate measures, I guess.

My mother finally must have caved in because Larisa walks into my room soon after the conversation stops. She closes the door behind her, so whatever she wants to talk about is something she doesn't want my mom to hear. Her hair is shorter than I remember, though still blue. She's almost as tall as me, which I remember teasing her about, she's always been just a tad shorter.

"Hey Axel, how're you feeling?" She asks me. She sits down on my bed. I wonder why everyone does that.

"Well, I'm not dead yet, though sometimes I feel like that's all that's left for me. So how have you been, and why did you have you hair cut so short?" I ask. I don't really want to talk about my life, it's depressing and boring, but Larisa must have something interesting going on.

"Oh, well, my hair's short because I've been doing a lot of running around, and I don't want my hair to cause me to sweat more than I need to. Of course, I don't have the heart to cut all of it off. As for what I've been up to, nothing much yet, other than my summer job, but this fall that's all going to change. I got a job with the ERA, the Environmental Restoration Agency, we're going to help the environment, just like I've always wanted to!" She says.

"That's great, Larisa, if anyone belongs there you certainly do. So, you said you had something important to tell me?" I ask.

"Oh, you heard that? A pretty good speech, I'd say it's one of my best. There's something that I want you to think about, and I'm sure you have a lot of time to do that," she says.

"Yeah, I certainly do. What is it?" I ask.

"Do you know why I joined the ERA?"

"Because you care about the environment?"

"No, well, yes, but that's not the point. I joined the ERA because I want to be somebody, I don't want to be another grain of sand on the beach of humans, I want to do something, I want to make a difference. Even though it seems impossible, there's ways for you to make a difference too." She jerks her head towards the window, as if suggesting that I escape the house and go live my life free from the limitations. "I know you have some big dreams, and you should live 'em, no matter what condition you're in." She stands up and opens the door.

"You're going already?"

"Yeah, I've got an appointment with destiny."

"I thought Destiny left last year. Didn't her family move?"

"You just don't want me to have an epic exit, do you? Good luck Axel." And with that Larisa leaves, and closes the door behind her. I'm glad someone in the world realizes the importance of closing the door behind them, my mom certainly doesn't. Larisa's always been the one person in the world who understands things like that, the ERA certainly has a great new employe and their hands.

What she said kinda confuses me a bit though, what does she think my big dreams are? I'm not some kind of environmental protection guy, I'm not the guy who cares more than the average person about the starving children out there somewhere, I'm just me. I've never really thought about being more than just a human, about making my life worth something more than just me, but Larisa makes a good point. There has to be more to our lives than just living for the split-second joy of one thing before moving to another. There must be more than just working to live, and living to die, there has to be something more for me.

I try to think about something that I could do with my life, but nothing comes to mind. I decide to try sleeping; to see if any bright ideas come to me when I'm fully rested. I lie my head down on my pillow and try to let the warm embrace of sleep consume me, and eventually I succeed.


	3. 85 BPM

As I awaken and sit up my first thought is, "I never ate my soup". It has probably gone bad by now, it's a waste, really. I sit up and look around my room. I don't know why, it's not like I'm going to find anything of interest here.

Nevertheless I look around and see just what I expected to see. My organized room. I would prefer to have a messy room, where I leave things where I want because, well, why the heck not? But my mother would force me to clean my room if I made a mess, and I'd prefer not to waste my time.

I look out the window, expecting to see the trees, maybe I can get an idea of what time it is. Instead of seeing what I expect, I find a gothorita standing on the other side of the window, looking at me. My heart rate increases. I look at my watch, 87 bpm, that's not too bad. It certainly couldn't hurt to stand up and look at it could it?

I stand up and slowly walk towards my window. The gothorita beckons to me. What? Why would the gothorita beckon to me? Why would a wild pokemon do that? I step closer to the window, trying to figure out more, almost hypnotized by the gothorita's call. I continue to slowly walk towards the window until the gothorita eventually walks to my left, out of the range of my visibility that I have through my tiny window. I press my hands to the window, hoping that it will come back, but no such luck. I open the window and think.

Do I really want to go outside? Do I want to recklessly abandon my life of doing nothing for who knows what? Heck yeah I do. A life lived for nothing but living isn't a live that's worth being lived at all. I fully open the window and slide out, grateful that the log cabin is only a one story building. I refuse to be that darn princess stuck at the top of a tower, waiting for her prince. I'm my own prince, I am my own destiny. I land on the ground and stand up.

I look at my watch, 85 bpm, I've calmed down a little, that's nice. I look around and see the gothorita on the edge of the tree line, beckoning to me once more. I slowly walk towards it, it also slowly moves towards the forest, keeping the distance between us constant.

When I reach the tree line it's much harder to see the gothorita, but, luckily, I have not lost sight of it yet. I follow it for what feels like ten minutes, and then I lose sight of it. I look behind me, just trees. There's just trees in every direction. I've been going in many directions, so I can't try to go back to my house now.

I look at my watch, 95 bpm, maybe I should sit down and figure out what to do. Yes, that's what I should do. I begin by sitting down, but find that it's more fun to lie down and look at the trees above me. Then I realize something.

What if there are pokemon in here? If so, I can't fend for myself. Heck, I couldn't even fend for myself if there were no pokemon, and all I had to do was figure out how to get food and water.

But at least I'm free. At least I'm living for once, at least I'm not a slave to the concept of living another day to be nothing more but a slave forever. I'm finally alive, for the first time in years, there are no burdens to carry, I am free, I am alive.

I lie on the grass, congratulating myself for making the right choice, then I feel a light tap on my shoulder. Is the gothorita back? I look to my right, the direction that the tap came from, and I see a cute little purrloin.

I pet its head gently, still not moving from the position in which I lay.

"What are you doing here, little buddy? Did you come to be friends?" It looks at me with its large eyes and nods its head. "Thanks little buddy, that means the world to me." It smiles and continues to let me pet it. It feels good to already have a pokemon friend, especially with the rotten luck I had earlier with that gothorita. As I continue to pet it I feel my watch unhinge from my wrist. It falls on the ground, and the purrloin takes its eyes away from me; beginning to stare at the watch. "Whoops. I guess my watch fell off." The purrloin smirks at me, and picks up the watch with its paws.

"Purrloin loin," it says in its pokemon language before running away, on two legs, with my watch.

"Hey! Come back here with my watch! I need that to live!" I yell at it, but it doesn't care, it just keeps on running, growing farther and farther away from me as times passes. Should I stand up and catch it? I wish that I could catch it, but I know that chasing it would be as fruitless as trying to chase a rainbow. I could never catch it, it'd just be a waste of time and energy.

I guess, in the great spectrum of life, the watch doesn't even matter. What do I need it for? To tell me my heart rate? I know I'm going to die, so why bother having the measurement of said death ticking constantly on my wrist? It's just a torture device, telling me what to do and what not to do. It's a burden of which I have been relieved.

"Nevermind! You can keep it! Thank you!" I shout at the Purrloin. I guess if I'm going to start fresh, it makes sense to get rid of the stupid thing anyways. Why bother to acknowledge that I have a heart problem? I just want to be a normal teenager for the rest of my life, no matter where that takes me.

I seem to have the worst luck with the pokemon that I meet, though. A pokemon that gets me lost and a pokemon that steals from me? What's next? A pokemon that breaks my leg?

But at least I'll be free when that pokemon comes. And when my death comes, I will have known what true freedom is.

**Sorry for taking so long to update everything, school, and a certain fanfic I've been working on (which I have no announced yet, despite being over 3,000 words in) have kept me pretty busy. I'll try harder to update more frequently, but I cannot make any promises at this point. Thank you for reading! And hey, if you feel like it, go ahead and review! If you don't, though, that's cool too, I'm just glad that you're here. **


	4. BPM Unknown

"Life is full of wonderful surprises," Larisa had once said to me. Oh Larisa if you could see me now! You failed to mention that life is full of disastrous surprises as well. Like my heart that doesn't want to be a heart. What do you want to be, heart, a modern dancer? You're a heart, and I'm a teenage boy. Neither of us is a modern dancer, so grow up and deal with it!

Having a heated argument with you heart. Yeah, real smart Axel. Real smart. What's next, you going to tell your arms that they can't be lawyers?

"Objection!" I yell. I laugh at my own oddness, it's fun to be real. Out here, for once in my life, there are no limitations. Maybe my arms can be lawyers. Heck, I can do whatever I want.

I stand up, there's no point in lying down any more, I might as well walk around and try to find some food. It only takes me a few minutes to find a tree which has some oran berries. I grab one off of the tree, quickly inspect it, as to make sure that it is not rotten, then take a big bite. It's delicious. I quickly finish the berry, and decide to explore the forest. What could possibly go wrong, right? I mean, I've already lost everything but my clothes, and I'm pretty sure no pokemon would want to take my jeans and t-shirt. And why would one just brutally attack me? They wouldn't, obviously... I hope.

You know what'd be nice? Becoming a pokemon trainer. I should do that! Okay, where's that famous Professor Juniper? Let's see... Nuvema town! Yes, I'm sure that's what the television said. I just hope she's still giving out pokemon. Now, how the heck would one get to Nuvema town from here?

Let's see, I know that I'm in the woods South of Straiton city. So that means that if I keep going South I should end up in Nuvema town eventually, I think. I need to get better at geography.

Let's see, the sun rises in the east, and it's early in the morning. I look into the sky and find the sun in the sky. Okay, so the direction the sun is in is east, and it's to my right. South is ninety degrees away to the right away from the east, so that means that south is right behind me. Or in front of me. Darn it. So how do I figure out which way is south, then?

Wait! I've got it! To the west there's a river, and that river flows to the south! So if I find the river and follow it, I'll have a constant source of water, and be able to find Nuvema town! Perfect! So all I have to do is walk away from the sun, and then follow the river. Maybe I'm not as bad at geography as I thought!

I do as I plan, and walk away from the sun. Thankful that I figured out what to do with my new found freedom. I'm going to get a pokemon!

After ten minutes or so of walking I come to the river. I honestly thought that it'd take me much longer than that, I must've been much closer to it than I had imagined. Well that's wonderful, I can see the way that the river's going, so all I have to do is follow the flow. Or, _go_ with the flow, as it were. I laugh to myself, partially grateful that I have no traveling companion yet, he or she would not like that joke, that's for sure. Hopefully, when and if I do get a pokemon it's as fun loving and crazy as I am.

After a few minutes of walking to the south I come across a girl. Yes, for some reason a girl who seems to be around ten years old with a blue dress that goes all the way down to her knees and brown boots was just walking in the forest. She walks up to me, tilts her head a little, and smiles sweetly.

"Hello," she says in a way that's practically singing it, but just not quite there. Her mid-sized brown hair gets in her face, so she brushes it away with her hand. "Stay."

"Um. Hi," I respond. I haven't had contact with a real human girl, except for ones who knew me pre-hospitalization, which is just by mother and Larisa. What does one say to a girl? What does one say to anyone you don't know, for that matter? "So what are you doing in the middle of the forest?"

"Uh, um. Nothing much, just came out here to be by myself. Er... To be away from everyone I know, you know? It's pretty chaotic, what with the pokemon choice coming up soon and all. I only have today, and I still haven't figured it out. Tepig, oshawott or snivy, darn it! Tepig is spirited and inspiring, oshawott is funny and friendly. Well, I guess I don't really like snivy, so at least that rules that out. What did you choose? Maybe that'll help me decide," she says.

"I'm actually going to Nuvema town right now to get my first pokemon, if I can."

"So I can have a rival!"

"I guess, but I'm six years older than you are."

"So what? As long as we get our pokemon at the same time, neither one of us has the advantage, right?"

"I guess."

"So what pokemon are you going to get?" I guess I never thought about that. It depends on their personalities, though. I want a fun travel companion, it doesn't matter which pokemon it is to me.

"I'm kinda planning to wait and see what the pokemon act like. That way I can pick a partner who will work the best with me."

"That's a good plan! I think I may just have to jump onto that bandwagon!" I laugh.

"Go ahead, we may as well both try to find the partners that fit us best." She smiles. We should probably get going if we want to arrive in Nuvema town tonight."

"Ah, so your birthday is tomorrow?"

"Yes, and I need to wake up early tomorrow."

"Then we should walk and talk." I start walking towards the south, and she walks beside me.

"So how come you're starting your pokemon adventure six years late?" I can't tell her about my heart condition, my hospitalization, I'm over all of that. I'm new, there is no 135 bpm limit, there is no limitations any more.

"My... parents are very over-protective." Not a complete lie, they are, but it's certainly not the full truth either.

"So what made them finally change their minds?"

"They never did. I just got up one day and left."

"They must be really worried about you!"

"Promise not to tell anyone? I can't let anyone know that I'm going on a journey without my parents' consent." She smiles at me, probably happy that I already trust her enough to tell her a secret.

"Don't worry, your secret's safe with me." She winks at me.


End file.
